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Operation Enduring Freedom

Projects

Overview

Objective

During U.S. military operations in Afghanistan in 2001, NCAR provided the National Ground Intelligence Center (NGIC) with mesoscale model products that were used to calculate the potential atmospheric transport and diffusion (T&D) of hazardous material.

Description

NCAR operated an MM5-based, rapidly relocatable, nested mesoscale data-assimilation and forecast system for NGIC, that provided analyses and forecasts of winds on a variety of scales, from the area of the entire country down to the scale of metropolitan areas. During the period of support, the model fine grids were moved depending on the area where the potential threat needed to be assessed. NGIC used the winds and boundary-layer properties produced by MM5 as input to the Second-Order Closure Integrated PUFF model, a DOD T&D model. The complex orography of the area, and the extreme thermal environment, created a challenging analysis and forecast problem.

Funding:

The National Ground Intelligence Center provides scientific and technical intelligence (S& TI) and general military intelligence (GMI) on foreign ground forces in support of the warfighting commanders, force and material developers, DA, DOD, and National- level decisionmakers. The NGIC also manages the Army's Foreign Material Exploitation Program and foreign material acquisition requirements and constitutes a single authoritative source for comprehensive ground forces threat to the Army and other services.

Operations

Operations

Military surface operations can benefit from high-resolution operational weather forecasts in a variety of ways, including the use of precipitation forecasts for soil trafficability estimation, cloud and fog forecasts for assessing the usefulness of electro-optical weapons systems, and wind forecasts for conducting precision air drops and for calculating the transport of hazardous material and obscurants released on the battlefield.

One example of the use of the 4DWX model in a rapidly evolving situation was its employment in support of ground operations in Afghanistan in late 2001. The National Ground Intelligence Center (NGIC) required high-resolution meteorological forecasts for different operational areas in order to assess the consequences of the possible release of hazardous material. For this application, the meteorological model had an interface to a DOD transport and dispersion model - the Second-order Closure Integrated PUFF (SCIPUFF) model that is part of the Hazard Prediction and Assessment Capability (HPAC) system.

Technology

Real-Time Four Dimensional Data Assimilation (RT-FDDA)

The Real-Time Four Dimensional Data Assimilation (RTFDDA) system is a computer-model that was originally developed by NCAR for producing analyses of current meteorological conditions and forecasts for U.S Army test ranges. Since then, the system has been adopted by other DoD and government agencies for support of special missions and for homeland-security applications as well as overseas operations such as in Iraq and Afghanistan.

RTFDDA focuses its computational resources on forecasting for specific geographic areas - not the entire continent, for example. This narrow focus enables the model to resolve a greater number of meteorological features while maintaining accuracy. The forecasting system can be deployed worldwide to address threats of a human or man-made nature. For example, RTFDDA has been used for counter-terrorism support for both the Athens and Salt Lake City Olympics and to forecast the movement of hazardous material potentially released into the atmosphere. The system was used by the Army to support operations in Afghanistan and Iraq and it provided superior forecasts of Hurricane Rita in September 2005. In summary, the system excels at representing the details of the day-to-day weather in urban areas, as well as the extreme weather associated with hurricanes and thunderstorms.